1. Field
The invention is a method and device for catching and packaging live fish, particularly tropical aquarium fish maintained for sale.
2. Prior Art
The common way of catching and packaging live fish in the sale of same for household aquariums is to dip a net into the confined body of water in which the fish are swimming, entraping the fish in the net, removing the net and entrapped fish from the water, removing the fish from the net, and placing the fish in a packaging container pre-filled with water. The use of nets, however, poses a serious problem. Very often a fish will become entangled in the net and be injured, either in the net or during the process of untangling and transfering the fish to the packaging container. Even without becoming entangled, mere contact with the net may and often does cause severe damage to the fish, particularly to its eyes. These problems are recognized in paragraph 8.3 of a book entitled "Marine Aquarium Keeping" by Stephen Spotte.
To overcome such problems, it has been suggested in the aboveidentifid book that a plastic bag be used to catch the fish, and that the plastic bag be the same as is commonly used as a packaging container for fish caught by a net.
The use of plastic bags for catching fish has not come into wide use, however, because of the difficulties they impose in catching the fish. A person must hold the bag open under the water and move the open bag through the water in pursuit of the rapidly moving fish. No method has heretofore been suggested for effectively catching a fish with a plastic bag.